Unescapable Ends
by Phantomholdsmyheart2743
Summary: A different way of processing the mask betrayal. Christine has a few things to say to the Opera Ghost, and along the way she is reminded he is a man. E/C COMPLETE One-Shot


Hello lovely readers. I have been reading a lot of poetry lately, and as a result of rereading the lovely poem "May I feel Said He" by e.e. cummings have been inspired to write this little one-shot. Do let me know what you think, the style is slightly experimental. Also, this is the most racy thing I've ever published.

"Unescapable Ends"

Christine watched him over the rim of her teacup. He was impeccable. She hated him for it. He was always so collected, so impossibly steady. So uncaring. So infuriating. Except that time… Oh that awful time when she had been subject to the wrath of the Opera Ghost. She had seen his face, but unlike the tales of Buquet, she did not die.

He had knocked her to the ground, railed and cursed; he had never laid a hand on her. And his eyes, his beautiful golden eyes had begged for her regard from within his broken mirror of a face. It didn't matter. His face didn't matter, and that is why she had been crying that day as he stalked and shouted.

She could not hate him. How could she hate the man whose voice made her shake with unholy emotions, whose music seduced her completely to the dark?

He had been ignoring her cries to the mirror. Every night for a week she had called him until she had given up. He was standing there when she came in from rehearsal, tall and imposing. Daring her to scream. She had opened her mouth to shout, raised her hand to strike, but ended abandoning that to take his offered hand. Holding it tight in her own as they traveled through the endless dark to his home. Christine realized too late that she had been staring.

He caught her gaze and she saw his gold eyes flicker and darken. He looked away. She hated that damned mask! That leather crown that dissuaded her from reading him the way he always seemed to be able to read herr. Coward.

He had barely spoken to her except to ask her how many sugars she required for her tea.

She set the teacup down with agitation, and it clattered. He hadn't touched his tea-oh of course he hadn't. Not the Opera Ghost. Not the damned fallen angel. Not…

"Erik," His name sprung out of her mouth, and she felt her cheeks heat.

"Christine?" Oh that voice, that heavenly voice. It curled its way to her ears, and her heart began to beat a little faster.

She couldn't begin to verbalize her thoughts. "You haven't touched your tea."

The room became still with tension. His hands clenched. She leveled her gaze.

"What are you implying?" He said easily.

"I'm not implying. I'm telling you to drink your tea before it goes cold."

"If it makes you more comfortable." Sarcasm laced his words, but he lifted the delicate china to his lips.

She waited. "It's the least you can do for letting me cry myself to sleep on the floor of my dressing room every night for a week."

He sputtered, and tea dripped onto his jacket, making spots on the black silk. A tinge of wicked satisfaction, but she wasn't nearly finished. All the words she had been dying to say began to spill out of her without regard for modesty or societal femininity.

"A whole week, Erik. I called and called for you. You left me there and didn't come back, didn't write, didn't leave any sign. I didn't know whether you were gone…"

"I didn't think…"

"You never think, Erik. For five years you have taught me. We've laughed, and you know things about me that I never told to another soul. I trusted you." Tears began to slip down her cheeks, she wrapped her arms around herself, but continued. "You left."

Unable to sit anymore, Erik rose and rushed to her. "Forgive me, Christine. I was unaware that my absence had so distressed you. My face is..."

"I starved on the streets of Paris. I am not as fragile as you believe. I loved you" She wiped her tears away with the back of her hand. Erik silently extended to her a clean handkerchief that smelled of sandalwood. He seemed to be studying her deeply. She blushed again, realizing how close they were. How tall he was. His black hair had come free of its usual stern confines, and fell over his eyes. Stark against the mask. Striking in its disarray. It seemed indecent, intimate. Oddly, she had to restrain herself from pushing it back.

"Loved?" He seemed to fly away from her, walling himself in. She felt exposed.

"Love." She amended. Realized it was true, despaired. She felt like she was dying, burning, falling apart. Waiting for his reply, breath stolen. He was suddenly eyeing her with the gaze of a jealous predator.

"I have loved you from the first moment I heard your voice." He whispered. His voice shook.

"It's settled then. We're fine."

She swallowed nervously. He was so tall. So distinguished. So intently focused. She found herself thinking of those lessons, all the times where she wished she could reach out and touch him, wishing he were more than a voice. The steady way he had held her hand that night in the tunnels, and again today. Palm to palm, as holy palmers kiss...

"Christine, are you afraid of me?" His eyes bored through her.

"No," She felt herself inching closer yet. She felt his heartbeat, or perhaps it was hers? "I'm intrigued."

"Oh?" She could hear the arch of his brow in his tone. She wished he were not wearing a mask. Was ashamed of herself for wishing so. Her heart was beating fast, and all of her seemed to be laced in a corset growing tighter and tighter.

"You never touch me?" She blurted.

"That does not mean I do not wish to."

He was bitterly sincere, a man resigned to loving a star. The way he ducked his head to hide his eyes made her want to lift his chin, to touch. To kiss.. She ran her hand down his arm, took his ungloved hand. Skin on skin. He shuddered.

"Erik," She had to be going mad. She loved him desperately. She had to have lost her wits. He loved her. She had to get him to touch her. "Please."

"Oh, Christine." Slowly, never breaking their shared gaze, he brought her hand to his lips. She tightened her grip on his hand, gasping.

This was escalating quickly. She'd have it no other way. Years of learning each other verbally sans touch led to this; this boundaryless communion of joined hands. Her free hand rose to smooth the softness of his unmasked cheek. Tore away the mask on impulse, but slowly. He could have stopped her. He didn't move. She didn't flinch, stroking his abnormal flesh with steady hands. Feeling his breath raised goosebumps on her arms.

"I do not deserve you." Erik wondered. "I am a monster."

"You are mine." She replied. He kissed her fingertips as she traced his lips.

"You are divine." He dared to tangle one hand in her hair. Stroking, stroking.

It was strange, the utter absence of doubt, of misunderstanding. Love unaided by intoxicants. Uninterrupted by chaperones. They had both been so alone.

His lips on her cheeks, her eyelids, the tip of her nose, her lips. Her arms around her neck, offering her mouth to be kissed. The warmth of him, the taste. Her soft sighs and his deep groans as they learned the notes of desire.

At last, at last. Skin on skin. He murmured words of beauty in languages that she could not understand. Hands stroking, hearts beating. Sweat and sex perfuming the room. Bare and unashamed as they played each other like pianos until the end of the song. The final words: the other's name on their love-swollen lips.

No more ghosts. No more tears. Only love.


End file.
